


Cold Front

by rhorhodey



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Azumane Asahi/Nishinoya Yuu, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Future Fic, Guardian Deity Nishinoya FTW, Hurt/Comfort, Kageyama Tobio is Bad at Feelings, Kageyama Tobio-centric, M/M, asahi is really only mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-02
Updated: 2020-04-02
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:00:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23438851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhorhodey/pseuds/rhorhodey
Summary: They’re Kageyama and Hinata—Tobio and Shoyo. They’re the freak duo. They’re them—together and separate and entirely connected. They’re shared glances and brain cells and small laughs and awkward smiles. They’re flushed cheeks and soft presses of kisses on warm flesh.Hinata’s bright and loud and concentrated.And Kageyama—Kageyama’s cold.
Relationships: Azumane Asahi/Nishinoya Yuu, Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio
Comments: 20
Kudos: 236





	Cold Front

**Author's Note:**

> wahhhhh my first foray into the haikyuu fandom. it’s so wild to be a baby in a fandom wow. this hasn’t happened in so long (jkjklolthelasttimewasliterallymylastfandom—we out here never being in time for the party hhhhh)
> 
> BUT WOWOW hi! thanks for tuning in. i hope this is okay and fun. this plot bunny really just surfaced because i realized kageyama has a big track record of always giving into hinata, and i thought—“okay tHAT but make it hURT and lets take asanoya down with us”
> 
> i’ve been working on it for months because y’know first work in the fandom and all that, characterization had to be on point (although we probs failed at that lol rip), but this quarantine finally let me sit down and binge write the rest.
> 
> as always, it’s written on my phone, so here’s hoping the html coding isn’t wonky and that spelling and grammar are understandable haha apart from that:
> 
> ENJOY!

Tanaka’s looking at him weirdly, so weirdly it’s painful, and, honestly, he can’t say he wouldn’t be looking at himself the same way if he was in his shoes. It doesn’t—there’s not much he can do about it, just continue to stand in front of the doorway with blotchy red skin and a soaked through shirt and pray he’ll be let in. It doesn’t stop this overwhelming feeling of not belonging from sinking into his skin and making it shrink, bones threatening to puncture through the suddenly taut flesh.

“Ryuu,” a voice calls from inside, and there’s the faintest sound of footsteps approaching, “who’s at the door?”

Tanaka fumbles, expression flickering between so many before his lips are breaking into a smile even as his brow furrows, beckoning him inside and closing the door. Accepting the guest slippers he’s handed with a small bow and a mumbled thanks, he slips out of his shoes, tucking them onto the rack, shoving his feet in the slippers. The apartment is warm, and he wishes his own felt like this, but it’s been empty so much this past week, there didn’t seem to be enough of a reason to turn the heating on. He’s made do with blankets and locking himself in his bedroom.

“Ryuu,” the voice calls again, and he fights back the burn in his eyes at the sound, the reason he came over here to begin with, as the man rounds the corner to peer at the doorway and his eyes widen marginally. “Kageyama,” he calls, smile stretching across his face, with the same furrowed brow Tanaka’s sporting.

He knows it strange. He knows it’s weird that he’s here, that he chose to come here. He knows. He does. But he didn’t know where else to go. He couldn’t think of anywhere else he would rather go. He just knew he couldn’t be in that apartment one second longer, not when it was so cold—not when he was so absent. He couldn’t do it. And Nishinoya—

He was the first person he thought of.

“Dude, your shirt is soaked—what happened,” Nishinoya asks, coming over with that same unwavering grin. “Ryuu, you’re missing your show,” he says, and it’s a clear dismissal that Tanaka doesn’t hesitate to take him up on, giving a parting grin to Tobio that’s more reassured than the first one—like he feels better now that he knows Tobio’s with their resident guardian deity.

Nishinoya‘s hand is small and warm as it wraps around his wrist gently, guiding him out of the entryway and to the kitchen. It makes his eyes burn, and his cheeks flush hotly, throat flexing. He looks at his feet in the guest slippers as he’s led into the kitchen. The seat he’s gently directed into is hard underneath him, but steady, and the cushion on it is firm with enough give to soften the aches in his bones. It’s somehow reassuring, and he sits as Nishinoya putters around the kitchen on bare feet that are tough with callouses, much like his own.

He looks down at his hands.

“Right, here we go,” Nishinoya hums as he places a glass in front of Tobio and Tanaka comes into the room brandishing a soft black shirt. He blinks at it as it’s held out to him.

“Dude, your shirt is soaked. Just change into this one and we’ll put yours in the wash.”

He blinks again, owlishly, but he feels he might appear even ruder if he were to decline, so he reaches his hand out and accepts it, briskly changes out of his shirt and tugs the dry one on. When he looks up, wet shirt curled in a hesitant grip, Nishinoya is staring at him with an unreadable expression so similar to when he’s in a game. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience,” he mumbles quietly as he hands the shirt over to Tanaka. The man laughs.

“Don’t apologize—you chose a good day. We were supposed to do laundry, anyway.”

As he leaves, Tobio thinks about the fact that it’s Wednesday, and he’s fairly certain no one does laundry on a Wednesday. His nose burns.

“Why’s your skin all red,” Nishinoya hums, nudging at the glass in front of Tobio to remind him of its existence. He peers at it curiously, flushing a bit happily at the sight of milk. He takes a sip, face scrunching at the peculiar taste. “Ah, it’s hemp seed milk,” the short man explains, tugging out the carton from the fridge to display to Tobio. “It has kind of a nutty flavor which I thought was cool. Anyway, Ryuu’s been having some problems with dairy recently, so we switched to this. It didn’t make sense to buy two different kinds—plus,” and here Nishinoya leans closer conspiratorially, voice lowering to a hush, “I know Ryuu was still drinking the regular when we still had it in the fridge. He thought I didn’t, but I knew.” The man pulls back and laughs, and Tobio can’t help but crack a hesitant smile.

He takes another sip of the milk. It’s not that bad, he thinks.

“Now, why’s your skin all red?”

“I spilled the water for my tea,” he mumbles, looking down at the glass cradled between his palms. It’s cold, and it numbs his skin.

“How did you get it all over your shirt? I would understand pants, but your shirt is weird.”

He shrugs. “Shoyo left, and I knocked the kettle over when I sat on the floor,” he admits, feeling equal parts sheepish and devastated at the reminder.

Nishinoya turns back from tucking the carton back in the fridge, looking at Tobio pensively. “Did you guys get into a fight today?” He frowns at Tobio’s negatory head shake. “When?”

“About a week ago,” he breathes out, and hates that the air trembles as it leaves his lungs. He feels so fragile somehow, like he’ll break, and he thinks of all the things he should’ve done differently, all of the things he should’ve just choked down and not let out because he knows what he and Shoyo are like. He knows they’re both stubborn and have painfully dominant personalities, and he knows that sometimes he just has to give in. He’s learned to do it, and yet—he struggles. He struggles so much, and it hurts. It hurts whenever Shoyo storms out, and he’s left in the apartment, knowing he could’ve stopped it all but couldn’t because he couldn’t choke down his own responses. “He stopped by today to pick up a change of clothes, and he wouldn’t—he didn’t want to talk, is all, and,” he gives a small wave of his fingers, still wrapped around his glass, like it’ll summarize the rest of the events.

Nishinoya nods, hums, looks at Tobio’s glass with a pensive expression. Tobio takes another sip.

“It’s good, right?” Nishinoya sings, grin reappearing, and Tobio nods meekly, returns the smile awkwardly, sipping again as if to solidify his agreement. Nishinoya’s grin softens, and he leans against the kitchen counter, arms folded across his chest. “Are you okay?”

He shrugs, not sure of how else to respond. Is he okay? He’s not really sure. He and Shoyo don’t fight much. They really don’t. More often than not, they’re on the same wavelength, and they tend to have more petty squabbles than anything else that end in them still in the same apartment at the end of it, sitting on the couch, watching some cartoon or other that Shoyo’s interested in. They don’t end in the empty apartment and the cold and the overbearing silence that leaves him unable to even look at Shoyo because it’s not normal, and if he had just been better—if he’d been better—

“Do you want to spend the night here,” Nishinoya asks, and Tobio can only manage a mildly pleading look in his direction, feeling small and young even when there’s only a year difference between them. And Nishinoya is every bit the guardian deity Tobio knows him as when he smiles and hops closer, slapping Tobio’s back with a bright laugh. “This is going to be so fun! We can set up your futon in my room and watch some movies. We barely ever get to hang out just you and I,” he crows and swings over to the opening from the kitchen to the living room. “Ryuu, Kageyama and I are going to have a sleepover. Be jealous,” he sings, and Tobio’s face flushes as he hears the indignant squawk from the living room.

“What? No fair! We never get to hang out with him! You can’t hog him!”

“You already have plans with a certain director extraordinaire, though, so,” and Nishinoya trails off into cackles that are only just louder than Tanaka’s senseless whines. Tobio sinks in his seat a bit.

It’s the warmest he’s felt all week.

.

.

.

“You know in baseball, they paint their nails,” Nishinoya says as they sit on the couch, Nishinoya filing his nails gently with a small smile on his face. Tobio can’t help but frown, looking down in confusion, trying to imagine a game of baseball with the pitchers decked out in bright red nails. The visual doesn’t really work, accompanied with his frankly rudimentary knowledge on the sport, and he just focuses on Nishinoya’s small hands grasping his steady, getting lost in the rhythm of the file. “Their finger tips get really strained and take a lot of damage from the throwing of the ball,” Nishinoya continues, setting down the hand he had just finished working on and picking up the other one. “Taking care of their hands is important, and the nail polish helps strengthen the nail so that it has less of a chance of cracking and creating an injury.”

“Baseball,” Tobio begins, continuing as Nishinoya looks up from his task encouragingly, “uses a lot of fingertip strength?”

The beam he gets is almost blinding, and his face feels warm. He ducks down, almost trying to hide, and he’s not really sure what to do when faced with that kind of expression. It’s been a week since he’s had to pretend to be a productive member of society. How does he—how is he supposed to answer?

“It does! Apparently some of the pitches, you put all of your force behind your finger tips and let the ball go at that point.” Nishinoya appraises his hands, smiling down at his work. Tobio feels a prickle of self-consciousness build up his spine. “It’s kind of like setting,” he hums, and his eyes widen a bit, looking up at Nishinoya through high eyebrows, mouth just slightly agape. A clear bottle is brandished before him with a cheeky grin. “Want to try it?”

Ah, that’s what he had been building up to. That made sense. Tobio’s head bobs before he can really think about it, and Nishinoya unscrews the lid, setting the hand he plans on starting with on his knee. As he goes about getting to work, he notes, for the first time, that Nishinoya’s own nails shine a little in the light from the television neither of them are paying attention to. Is he wearing the polish, too? But it doesn’t contribute anything for someone like Nishinoya, right? So, why would he—

Why Nishinoya?

Not for the first time tonight, his mind circles back to that one question, taking in the tiny firecracker in front of him. At one point, he had thought it was because Nishinoya’s the most like Shoyo in looks and personality, but the thought felt icky and vile, and he felt gross after thinking it. It felt like reducing Nishinoya to some kind of weird rebound even though they were both very happy in their own separate relationships. His other thought was that it was for his caring nature, but if he wanted security, he could’ve gone to just about anyone from their friend group—except Tsukishima. And anyone Shoyo would probably run to.

So, why him?

Why here?

“There, all done,” Nishinoya sings, and Tobio feels something right in his chest stutter as he looks down at his hands in bewilderment. A chuckle has wide eyes flicking up to meet the crescent eyed mirthful gaze of the male before him, cheeks burning just slightly. “Penny for your thoughts,” he asks, and his tone is gentle even as his eyes lose some of their laughter and widen out of their smile induced shape, looking at him seriously and honestly, free of judgement or opinion.

Maybe that’s why he came here? Except he’s sure others would’ve been able to provide that same openness. Everyone is well versed with Tobio’s special brand of serious social awkwardness. Surely they would all be capable of having this unbiased foresight. So, then—

“I don’t know why I came here.”

It’s an admission he wasn’t planning on making, if he’s honest, but the words slip out, heedless of his own desires for them to not be voiced. He cringes away, like they’re something physical in the air, and Nishinoya blinks at him a little owlishly.

“I—I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to; I wasn’t supposed to. Those were, it’s just,” he trails off uselessly after his mouth flaps open and shut a few more times like a fish out of water and he figures he’s embarrassed himself enough.

Nishinoya blinks at him, once, then again, before his expression smoothens, and he smiles, this soft, brittle thing that reaches his eyes, but not necessarily in the way Tobio’s used to, and he can only stare uselessly at it. “I think you’re more perceptive than you give yourself credit for, Kageyama,” the shorter man says, and he stretches for the remote on the table and clicks the television off.

Despite not having been paying it any attention, the apartment feels suddenly too quiet without the idle chatter of some throwaway program they really hadn’t cared for. Now, the silence feels almost suffocating. He doesn’t understand Nishinoya’s words, nor that fragile smile, and he finds discomfort, not born from inside of him, but seemingly seeping into him from his surroundings, locking his limbs stiff and making his breaths slow.

“I guess some part of you realized even if you didn’t think of it consciously,” Nishinoya continues, like his current disposition isn’t making Tobio sit solid in his seat without hope of leaving because he can’t get his limbs to cooperate. “I figured you sought me out because you needed to find a way to deal with Hinata,” he leans back against the couch cushions now, but his head tilts down as if self-conscious, “and stop him from leaving.”

His ribs feel like they’re breaking.

“You’re scared he’ll leave, right,” the man continues, legs coming up to fold against his chest, arms wrapping around them. He looks small, somehow—smaller—like he’ll turn into a mere speck of dust and flit out of existence, an unsettling visual for someone with such a loud and boisterous personality like him. It’s almost painful to witness.

His head nods in a jerky movement while his throat works around the words lodged in there.

“Tell me?”

“When we fight,” the words sound thin and weak, and he clears his throat, like it’ll give him more strength. He looks away from Nishinoya, even though his gaze isn’t even on him, looking down at his hands, careful of still drying nails, and gazing at his palms, tracing the lines with his eyes. He tries again. “When we fight,” his voice seems stronger now, not as jarred without the strange visual Nishinoya poses against the cushions, “really fight,” he emphasizes, “he always leaves.”

Nishinoya gives the faintest of hums to show he’s listening.

“I,” he pauses, tries to think of the words to communicate what he thinks, what he feels, effectively, but they don’t come easy. “I think it’s good, maybe. He needs it, and I think I need it, too, but—but I don’t—he just—”

“Doesn’t come back,” is finished for him, and he looks up at that strange picture Nishinoya paints, sinking into the couch cushions like they’ll somehow swallow the small ball of his body up.

“Yeah,” he croaks. “It’s cold, without him. It’s so cold,” and his voice cracks on the last syllable, vision fracturing as tears threaten at his eyes until they’re dropping silently onto open palms, ready to catch and cradle his feelings like he’s the only one that will be willing to receive them. And isn’t that how it is sometimes? His negative feelings—all of the bad and the weak and the sad—he cradles them close and shoulders them alone, hugs them tightly to himself because he doesn’t know how to give them enough life to make the walk to someone else’s ears, so that they understand how they tear him apart and freeze him from the inside out.

“When does he come back?”

He blinks, inhales shakily. The tears still drip into his palms, but he thinks a few miss a little bit when he spares a glance over to Nishinoya who’s staring at him with the same concentration he did during a game, silent and focused. “When I give in,” he mumbles, and he’s certain that a few tears miss the mark as he can feel them still falling from his eyes, but their wetness doesn’t plop onto his skin. “He comes back, when I go to him, usually. Usually he’s right,” he continues, looks away, back at his hands, “or I think he is—I’m not sure, but it doesn’t matter—and I go, and we’re fine.”

“But you’re not,” the male sighs, and he looks at him, startled, tears stuttering to a stop even if his eyes remain wet. “You’re not fine,” he continues, clear brown eyes, as grounding as the earth, staring deep into his soul, “otherwise you wouldn’t have come here.”

He wants to argue. He wants to say he’s fine. He is fine. They’re fine. They barely ever fight for real. It hardly happens. They’re a healthy, functioning couple, he knows that. But—but it doesn’t matter if they’re a healthy couple, does it? Because why is he here, then? Why did he come here? Why did he come to the one person who might know that fear oh-so well? That fear of being left, abandoned?

“And every time you give in, every time you go to apologize or just concede, it feels like you’re losing something in yourself. And it moves into other parts of your life, too, because even though you don’t want to admit it, you’re scared—you’re terrified of him leaving, and if giving in, if conceding the fight, sometimes before it even starts, is the way to keep them around, you’ll do it. And you do it. And you keep doing it.” Nishinoya’s shoulders hunch. “It doesn’t feel like you’re giving much when it’s the minor battles, when it’s what to have for breakfast or whether or not to go to the gym with them or what to watch on the television.”

Tobio thinks of the cartoons he and Shoyo watch. He thinks of the cereals he’s had to abandon for eggs and ham and warm toast, of the new deodorant he stopped using because Shoyo said it messed with his clothes too much. He thinks of the side of the bed he had forsaken for Shoyo, even though he’s never been a fan of sleeping on the left. He thinks of the gatherings he’s gone to just to make Shoyo smile because he didn’t want to have an argument about being antisocial and embarrassed. The minor battles—

“But then the big ones come around, and you feel like each concession, you lose a little bit of yourself to that fear of them leaving. And it would be easier—it’d be okay—if they actually tried to come back on their own, if you didn’t have to hunt them down and confront them, but they don’t, and you know they won’t. And that fear—it just gets bigger and bigger, and you know, you know, that if you don’t go and find them, if you don’t give in, they won’t come back. Because they never come back.”

And Tobio—

Tobio finds himself crying in earnest now because he knows why he’s here now. He knows why. He knows why he chose to come to Nishinoya. It was because Nishinoya knows, knows intimately, that pain and that fear, because Nishinoya is strong and confident and so powerful, so reliable, everything Shoyo likes to tell Tobio he is, too, and Nishinoya knows. He knows what it’s like to feel like you’re being stripped of your identity because you’re terrified that you’re not enough, that you’ll never be enough, because your partner—your partner doesn’t stay. Your partner doesn’t come back. Your partner leaves, and you’re left trying to figure out if you’ll ever be enough, if you ever could be enough, if he’ll ever come back on his own.

Nishinoya’s arms are warm and his heart beats strong in his chest, and Tobio finds himself wailing into its confines because he doesn’t know who he is anymore. He doesn’t know if he can be himself with Shoyo as earnestly as he was anymore because he’s scared. He’s so, so scared. And he doesn’t know how to not be anymore.

And it’s cold. It’s so cold.

Nishinoya holds him through it, and Tobio doesn’t want to risk a glance up to see his expression, doesn’t think he can even manage to pull away. He’s warm, and all he has felt until today was cold, cold, cold, so he curls closer, selfishly so, and burrows deeper into Nishinoya and cries. He cries the tears he couldn’t shed before because he didn’t know how to put words to his feelings, didn’t know how to understand their might and weight, only that they were there and that they were so heavy it made it hard to move.

“It’s okay, Kageyama,” slowly filters into his ears, a soothing murmur as a hand strokes the back of his head, carding through the strands of hair, the other arm wrapped firmly and solidly around his shoulders, holding him close. “You guys can fix this, okay? It’s okay. I promise, it’s okay.”

It might’ve been minutes, it might’ve been an hour, but eventually Tobio feels put together enough to pull back and meet Nishinoya’s sincere, if not a bit intense, gaze. It’s reassuring, his conviction, how convinced he is that he and Shoyo can fix this, that they can keep being the happy and healthy couple they should be if Tobio wasn’t fucking it up like this like he does everything—and why wouldn’t Shoyo want to leave when all Tobio’s managed to do is feel so much that he’s destroying the stability and sanctity of their relationship, he’s a terrible boyfriend, he’s awful—

“You and Asahi—did you guys fix it,” he croaks questioningly, embarrassedly tugging away at the fragility of his voice, wiping at his face self-consciously. When he glances over after the silence stretches for too many long seconds that he’s scared of the answer, he sees Nishinoya again looking that same small way that makes him so uncomfortable because Nishinoya is larger than life. He’s this bubbling exuberance of energy. He’s not supposed to look so, so—defeated.

“Asahi is,” he trails off weakly, picking at the edges of his shorts. His arms and legs are still covered in bruises, like they were when they first met. “Asahi’s different. I can coach him into being more confident in day to day things, but there’s certain things where the voice in his head—he can’t win. He did it once, but,” and he looks up and Tobio knows he’s talking about the time he left the volleyball club and then came back, “it was only because you and Hinata got through to him enough that he ended up at the door, even though he had to be forced onto the court.” He sighs a little bit helplessly, head tilting back, looking up at the ceiling. His throat bobs as he swallows, and somehow he looks like he’s being choked even though he’s not—he’s not. “It took him two months and your intervention for him to come back. He can do it, but I can’t—it’s selfish, but I can’t wait that long for him to come back. I did it once, but he was in school with me. He had to be around. It was easier. But now,” he trails off, hiccups slightly and ducks his head a little like it’ll hide him. And Tobio hears his own fear echoing back at him. But now—now, they can leave. Now, they don’t have a chance to even see each other. Now, there’s no real incentive to come back when there’s no way to remind them what they can come back to without having to concede, without having to give in, without having to sacrifice again and again and again. “It hurts—it hurts too much.”

He remembers the heartbroken fury that had chilled Nishinoya’s warm gaze the first day they met. They hadn’t interacted much then, but he remembers that look when Asahi was brought up. He remembers that obvious pain that he had understood because he remembers, even now, all too vividly the pain of having his team abandon him—and he hadn’t really been all that close to them. The bond that Nishinoya and Asahi had, even back then, was tight, and he can’t imagine the pain of having Shoyo abandon him and say his sets aren’t worth spiking anymore. He can’t imagine the pain of having Shoyo leave him, abandon him, for two months with no hope of ever coming back, tearing him down in their last conversation before disappearing.

He’s not sure what he would do in that kind of situation. He’s really not.

“But Hinata’s not like that, so he can learn. He can learn to not leave for so long, or at all. You just need to talk to him,” Nishinoya encourages, and his smile is genuine, and it’s almost like that air has been forced back into his lungs. He doesn’t look like he’s choking anymore, looks bright and cheerful, like the darkest parts of his relationship hadn’t just been trying to crush him. “Your love is not fragile, just like mine and Asahi’s isn’t. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.”

He nods, even if uncertainty curls in his gut.

“And it’s okay if it hurts, Kageyama. It’s okay.”

.

.

.

Shoyo’s eyes are wide and bright, and it almost hurts to look at them, so he doesn’t, his own eyes squinting down at the floor like it’ll somehow make the bright visage in front of him more palatable. It doesn’t, but he didn’t honestly think it would. He figures it’s okay, though. With the brightness comes warmth, and he’s been so cold.

Nishinoya’s in Tobio’s room, entertaining himself in one way or another, ready to play mediator if Tobio needs it because he’s scared. He’s honestly terrified, and he can never put his emotions into words well enough—he knows he’ll fail because how can he expect Shoyo to understand what no one else does outside of Nishinoya? How can he make him understand something that the man in his room only gets because he’s also living it?

He’s not good with words. He’s not good with emotions. He’s not good—not good—not good enough—

Shoyo shifts, and anxiety sparks through him. His eyes flick over and he can’t tell, he can’t tell whether it’s irritation or nervousness that’s stringing itself along the lines of the fiery male’s muscles. It’s been years, and he doesn’t feel like he’s any better at reading Shoyo than when they first met. He feels like they’ve somehow fallen further out of tune in their personal lives than when they were younger, and it’s a terrifying thought to have and acknowledge.

He doesn’t want to be out of tune. All he wants is to be on the same page, like they always are, to just look at each other and know, understand, feel it in their bones. That’s their relationship, romantic or otherwise. They just clicked somehow, awkwardly and shyly, but perfectly, in his opinion. And now—he feels like he took it and tainted it, like he’s the reason that they’ve fallen so out of sync.

“Are you going to apologize,” Shoyo finally mumbles, shoulders hunched, elbows braced on his knees, peering up at him through fiery lashes with that searching brown gaze he fell in love with. All of that focus on him, at his side—that had been all he wanted for so long, all he still wants. He wonders how he could have been so cruel at to mess this up.

It’s easier to give in. He should just apologize, let them fall back into their usual pattern, lock away the hurt and the complicated emotions he doesn’t know how to speak into existence, smile for Shoyo and just—exist. He can give pieces of himself away as long as he’s giving them to Shoyo. He’d take care of them, right? He’d treasure them. He’d take all of what makes Tobio who he is and hold it close. Giving in—it would be so easy.

“Asahi is—Asahi’s different. I can coach him into being more confident in day to day things, but there’s certain things where the voice in his head—he can’t win.”

“It took him two months and your intervention for him to come back.”

“It’s okay if it hurts, Kageyama.”

He inhales shakily.

“If you’re not going to apologize—”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s okay—”

His hand lashes out and hovers just over Shoyo’s wrist as the male makes to rise, hovering over the flesh with a mild tremor that stays the fiery haired male’s movements. He can feel those eyes on him, but he can’t meet their gaze right now. He can’t. Because he has to say this, has to do it. Because he doesn’t want to end up like Nishinoya, crumpled into the cushions, being choked by acknowledgements of the faults, hiding shame and feeling weak over shortcomings he can’t change.

He can change this. He can try and fix this.

Shoyo isn’t Azumane. He isn’t battling through the same anxiety and shame and hesitation their older friend is. He’s secure in himself, in them. He can take this. Tobio can say this.

“It hurts,” he finally says, finally gets out, hand drawing back now that he’s sure Shoyo won’t leave quite yet. It shakes and he presses it into his thigh, sweaty and uncoordinated. He feels like he did when Shoyo had asked to kiss him for the first time, except all of those warm positive feelings that had swirled in his gut are absent, leaving only the anxiety and the sharp stabs of fear and the never-ending mantra of not being good enough, never being good enough, how could he ever be enough—

“Tobio, what,” Shoyo trails off, and he looks hesitant now, a bit scared, and Tobio regrets looking up, “what hurts?”

“You,” and it comes out in a croak, the word pushing against his throat so furiously it manages to nearly strangle his voice. Shoyo—he looks like he’s been slapped, hurt and anger warring in his eyes.

He watches those fingers curl tightly into fists. “That’s low, Tobio. All you had to do was just apologize—”

“I’m not talking about the stupid fight!”

In the silence that follows his outburst, he can hear a door open, but no steps come. He doesn’t know if Nishinoya’s left the room or if he was going back to it. He doesn’t know if he cares right now—trusts their guardian to come and do as his namesake suggests and protect should things go south.

In the silence that follows, he can hear his own shaking breaths. He can see Shoyo’s lips tremble as air exists them in a small rush, but his heart is beating a frantic tempo in his chest and hearing past his own noises is difficult. But he can see Shoyo, can see the confusion and concern painting his face, can see how the fight drifts out of his shoulders and how a new tension takes its place.

“Then,” Shoyo’s tongue peeks out, licks his lips, “what are you talking about?”

He takes a deep breath, presses his hands harder into his thighs like it’ll stay their trembling. “You leave every time,” he starts, swallowing around the words and choking them out. He tries to think back to his conversation with Noya, how the man had put what they both felt into words, had spoken it into existence in a way that has evaded him for so long. His glare ends Shoyo’s sentence before it starts, and he tries to soften his expression, tries to show he’s not mad, but he doesn’t think he’s very successful. The panic, the frantic desire to just get this out, to just say his piece and deal with the pain that may follow, has his expressions glitching, and he feels so inexperienced again.

He feels inadequate, helplessly so, in the face of Shoyo’s heedless emotions. He feels clumsy and embarrassed in the face of such openness. He feels small when faced with such expression when he can only stumble through threadbare approximations like they have the same value or weight.

Shoyo stays his words, lips pursing and eyes attentive as he nods his head a little bit. The relief he feels is almost dizzying, and he almost wants to tear up at the fact that even now—even now, Shoyo gets him, is understanding what his face is failing to communicate, what his words are failing to communicate.

“You need it.” He takes a deep breath in. “I don’t mind.” He lets it out. His fingers curl in the fabric of his pants and he turns his gaze to the floor, trying to ignore the feel of those eyes poking into him, trying to get ahead of the words leaving his mouth and prepare for the worst. “But,” and he hates how his voice cracks, clears it desperately and swallows against the sudden thickness in his mouth, presses his eyes shut, “you don’t come back.” His mouth clamps shut, lips folded over his teeth and pressing closed tightly as his shoulders hunch defensively, eyes squeezing tight.

“Tobio,” he hears breathed out next to him; the sentence is never continued. His name floats in the air, and he’s almost grateful that nothing more is said next to him.

“Every time,” he speaks once he feels his voice has gotten to some semblance of normal even though it still comes out thick and warbled despite his best efforts. “Every time, and I—I’m never sure if—if you’re going to come back, if—and—it hurts—Shoyo, it—and I’m—I’m sca—”

He’s warm.

He’s so warm.

Shoyo’s arms are strong and warm around him, and he can feel his pulse fluttering along the artery in his neck where his forehead is smushed, and can feel the press of fabric under his hands that had flailed up in alarm. And Shoyo’s warm and steady and solid against him, holding him tight, ribs expanding and contracting shakily like he’s also trying to stay the tears Tobio’s been fighting back since he sent the text to Shoyo to ask him to come home.

“Tobio,” Shoyo breathes, and he swallows again against the weight in his mouth, in his throat, in his chest, trying to breathe through the strain.

“It’s cold without you here, Shoyo. You can’t keep doing this. I can’t—I can’t—I’m sorry.”

Shoyo’s grip tightens, and he can feel his sharp chin digging into the crown of his head, dragging through his hair as a soft cheek presses down against it instead. “Stupid—why are you taking my line,” he mumbles, and his voice is soft and choked, and Tobio can’t fight the tears off any longer. It feels like a weight that’s been on his shoulders for months, years, has gotten just a little bit lighter. And that little bit, that ounce of relief, is enough to crack the dam, and the tears drip, silent and warm down his cheeks and soak into a soft shirt and dampen citrus smelling skin.

“I’m sorry I’m not enough.”

“No, no, no, Tobio—you’re enough. You’re more than enough. You’re more than—you’re everything, Tobio. You’re my king. What’s a knight supposed to do without his king, huh?” He can feel warm lips press into the crown of his head before the soft warmth of the cheek returns. “I’m sorry I ever forgot to remind you of that—forgot you—forgot to think of your feelings, too.”

The breath in his lungs shudders out of him, and he thinks he can be okay. They can be okay. Shoyo can take the criticism, the honesty, can learn, and he knows. He knows Nishinoya was right.

They’re going to be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> this fic was brought to you by hemp seed milk
> 
> drink up that good good fiber, y’all 
> 
> in all seriousness, thanks for reading this lil bunny of mine. i hope you all enjoyed it.
> 
> feel free to leave me a comment down below, and stay safe and healthy!


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